title: Effect of idler absorption in pulsed optical parametric oscillators.
abstract: Absorption at the idler wavelength in an optical parametric oscillator (OPO) is often considered detrimental. We show through simulations that pulsed OPOs with significant idler absorption can perform better than OPOs with low idler absorption both in terms of conversion efficiency and beam quality. The main reason for this is reduced back conversion. We also show how the beam quality depends on the beam width and pump pulse length, and present scaling relations to use the example simulations for other pulsed nanosecond OPOs.
authors.affiliation: FFI, Norwegian Defence Research Establishment, POBox 25, NO-2027 Kjeller, Norway. gunnar.rustad@ffi.no
authors.forename: Gunnar
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Rustad
authors.forename: Gunnar
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Arisholm
authors.forename: Øystein
authors.initials: Ø
authors.lastname: Farsund
mesh_terms: D000669:Amplifiers, Electronic; D017076:Computer-Aided Design; D004735:Energy Transfer; D004867:Equipment Design; D019544:Equipment Failure Analysis; D053844:Lasers, Solid-State; D008962:Models, Theoretical; D009991:Oscillometry / Q000295:instrumentation*